Fame at last! (Part 2)

Theresa Haine concludes her two-part account of the celebrations marking the anniversary of the martyrdom of Rasalama, the first Malagasy missionary.

At exactly 10am we heard the band strike up outside and in came all the government representatives then, last of all, the President and his bodyguard. The service lasted for full three hours but was well thought out and interesting. I managed my speech (in Malagasy) without too many hesitations. The President’s speech was not what we all expected. He suggested that the missionaries were agents for a foreign power and that the Queen’s actions in persecuting the Christians were justified – she was doing what she thought was right for the whole people. However, he praised Rasalama for her faith and courage.

At the end of the service massed choirs sang the Halleluia Chorus from Handel’s Messiah. There were several conductors following the beat of the orchestra conductor who was out of sight of most of the singers. Despite their efforts one end of the huge choir, about 1,000 voices, got out of step with the other for several anxious minutes but they managed to find each other (and the by-this-time frantic conductors) before the final triumphant Alleluia!

Once outside the stadium we were surrounded by beggars. I gave my cardigan to a poor ragged woman with a tiny naked baby and a toddler hanging on to her skirt. There were so many beggars that we had extreme difficulty extricating ourselves.

There was a formal dinner in the evening. The good meal and general high spirits made it a memorable end to a memorable day. The restaurant had a colour TV and we all watched ourselves on the box – the first time I have ever been on TV.

The following morning, just a few days before my return to the UK, a beggar woman with a toddler and a naked two-month-old baby followed me up 400 steps from the market place, down the other side of the hill to my friends’ place and back up the hill again. She was almost certainly the one to whom I gave my cardigan the previous day. I told her that I had no more clothes or money to give – which was true as I had only enough for the airport tax and my clothes were all packed. She then pleaded with me to take her baby abroad with me as its father had disappeared and she could not afford to keep it. It broke my heart, but in the end I had to take her to a social-worker friend who I hoped would know how to help her. Sadly I never heard the end of the story.